


Breathing exercises I will never figure out

by Cirkne



Category: The Social Network (2010)
Genre: Getting Together, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-18
Updated: 2017-03-18
Packaged: 2018-10-07 06:39:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10354368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cirkne/pseuds/Cirkne
Summary: When you’re around I don’t know how to hide my feelings.  I count in binary, in my head.  zero one one zero one one and you count clouds.x





	

After Erica but before the depositions, it is spring. It is spring and they are together, Eduardo’s thigh to Mark’s thigh and the grass where the blanket ends and their feet are inches apart. Mark’s laptop is about to die and he stopped coding a while ago, too afraid of losing something important when the battery finally gives out. He should tell Eduardo he wants to go home, but it’s hard when they’re like this. When Eduardo is like this. Warm against Mark through the fabric of their jeans, arms over his eyes, smiling. He looks happy. Soft, in a way. Vulnerable. Mark doesn’t want to take that away from him. Doesn’t want to take it away from himself either. 

It’s quiet when it’s just them too. Mark wonders sometimes if Eduardo enjoys silence as much as he does or if he’s learned to adapt. He knows, really, he just doesn’t like admitting he makes Eduardo’s life more difficult. Dustin thinks Mark doesn’t know. Dustin thinks he does these things and isn’t aware he’s inconveniencing them. He does know. Of course he knows but Eduardo doesn’t complain. Eduardo says: _alright_ his voice quiet and understanding and then he does whatever Mark has asked him to. It makes him awfully guilty sometimes but Eduardo’s with him now. He’s probably the only person that didn’t run away when Mark became too difficult. 

He turns to look at Eduardo and Eduardo is looking back now, the same smile still on his face. His brown eyes. His stupid, disheveled hair. His lips and his jaw and his neck. Mark looks away.

“I’ll go to New York this summer,” Eduardo says and Mark doesn’t look at him. Stares at the white of his laptop screen. He knows this, he thinks. Eduardo told him he might and Mark had asked what that meant for facebook and Eduardo had kept quiet. So Mark had kept quiet too. They’ve never been good at confrontation. They’ve never been-

“Did you hear me, Mark?” he asks. Rests his hand softly on Mark’s side, just below his ribs to make sure he’s paying attention. Mark gulps. Of course he heard him. 

“Yeah,” he answers. Clears his throat. “Yeah. You’re going to New York,” Eduardo moves his hand away.

“Are you okay with that?” he asks and Mark struggles not to laugh. Struggles not to scoff, really. Bites the inside of his cheek. Of course he’s not okay with that. He’s not okay when Eduardo doesn’t answer his phone sometimes and now he is going to be three thousand miles away.

“Yeah,” he repeats. Lies. They’ve never been good at confrontation. _Mark’s_ never been good at confrontation. Or feelings or acting like he doesn’t love Eduardo. Eduardo’s never been good at asking the right questions. At saying no. He’s with Christy because he doesn’t know how to tell her to leave. If Mark had told him sooner maybe he wouldn’t have said no to Mark either. If he had said something right after Erica. _I need you_ without asking for the algorithm. He probably wouldn’t have started working on facebook, then. Facebook is the product of him being angry. He wouldn’t be angry if Eduardo would have said yes to him. Maybe they’d be going to New York together. 

It’s all a theory, really. All relative. It’s all-

There’s a Mark that doesn’t want to kiss Eduardo and a Mark that doesn’t know one at all. There’s a Mark that wants to kiss Eduardo, that is kissing him. In his dorm room or on the blanket they borrowed from Dustin. The Everett interpretation exists to let you believe you are happy somewhere. To let you pretend your choices have no consequences. Or maybe to make you painfully aware they do. None of it ever makes sense. That’s why he sticks to numbers. Code is always logical and the way he craves Eduardo’s touch like he’s starving without it isn’t.

His laptop dies, finally. It makes him realize just close Eduardo actually is. He risks a glance again. Eduardo is no longer looking at him. He’s still smiling though, eyes closed to the sky, wind messing with strands on his hair. Eduardo opens his lips, slightly. Maybe to say something again. Maybe to taunt Mark more. To distract himself, he goes back to the one thing he knows. 

_zero one one zero one one zero zero zero one one zero one one one one zero one one one zero one one zero zero one one zero zero one zero one zero zero one zero zero zero zero zero zero one one one one zero zero one zero one one zero one one one one zero one one one zero one zero one_

It doesn’t help. 

“Join me,” Eduardo says and Mark pushes his laptop onto the grass, lays down. They’re even closer now. Thigh to thigh and shoulder to wrist and if this was anyone else the warmth would make Mark’s skin feel like it’s too big for him but it’s not anyone else. It’s never anyone else and Mark wonders if this is how Eduardo makes Christy feel, too and if that is why she refuses to let go of him. It all feels too big for him to think about. 

“Zero one one zero one one,” he starts to mumble under his breath. Over him, Eduardo says:

“I think I’m in love with you,” and everything stops. The way it always does around Eduardo. Except, it doesn’t. Except next thing Mark knows, he is turning and kissing Eduardo and Eduardo is kissing back, his hand soft against Mark’s face and Mark’s hands are probably rough and all the binary leaves his head.

If he was a better person, Mark would ask about Christy. He’d ask about them. He’d pull back and say: _I don’t actually want you to go to New York please stay because I don’t know what stupid things I will do if you’re gone_. He’s not a better person. He keeps kissing Eduardo. Their feet get tangled together. The sun is high above them and Mark’s neck feels hot. He might be going red. He might be dressed too warmly for California’s spring. Eduardo says it’s a defense mechanism. Him and his hoodies with pockets to hide his hands. It’s probably not a defense mechanism. Eduardo thinks too much. 

He says it when they pull away and Eduardo laughs and agrees and Mark tangles their fingers together.

*

The Everett interpretation exists to let you believe you are happy somewhere. Months later, Eduardo in front of him and their lawyers on either side of them, Mark thinks about it again.

**Author's Note:**

> for a softer world prompt on tumblr.
> 
> the binary spells out "love you" only bc im tacky
> 
> title from flashlight by the front bottoms


End file.
